faqs

A breakthrough customizable virtual world.

Use on any Apple or Android tablet.

Play together to build communication bridges and deepen understandings.

  • Evidence-based engagement therapies at your fingertips
  • Tapping on objects brings them to life
  • Co-designed with memory care residents, research-led
  • Populate Deva World with photos, music, and meaningful objects that relate to your player. Easy to upload
  • Multi-cultural and multi-lingual versions available. Ask us how. 
  • In-built life-story capsule describes the person – not their dementia – bringing caregivers immediate insights
  • Players share, express, have fun; they are well in-the-moment. Caregivers report that after a session, participants are happy and settled
  • Free-to-share with your care circle
  • We’re in the cloud. Deva goes where you go
  • Enterprise level dashboard for administrators

Deva World is most suited to people with cognitive challenges, supported by a caregiver such as a family member or care professional. Deva has been developed to addresses people’s loss of independence, eroded confidence, and shrinking world. Interactive objects trigger memories and build empathy and understanding.The experience of navigating Deva World together, has been shown to soothe, delight, and strengthen your care partnership. 

Engagement is widely recognized as a way for a person impacted by dementia to feel well, even if only in the moment. It has been said, “when a person is engaged, dementia leaves the room”. As domain specialists in digital engagement, we’ve devised a unique set of design principles that enable ‘supporters’ (you) and ‘players’ to play together with (virtual) activities daily living (ADL) in a fun, interactive and expressive way. When you run a Deva session, you’ll notice your player responding to stimuli without risk or a sense of failure. As you explore Deva World together, you’ll share stories related to common lived experiences, and respond to music and photos you’ve added to their world. These experiences are calming. Players feel settled, less isolated, and more understood. Our field studies show that a player’s sense of wellbeing extends after the session itself and that cooperation increases. Please refer to our case study to learn more.

Step 1.  First, Join. As an account holder, your first month is free, and no credit card is needed. (We’ll prompt you to subscribe after that.)

Step 2. Go to the Deva Dashboard, your admin portal situated at the top right menu, and set up a profile for your player’ (the “player” is the person you care for). Here, you can add media to their player-profile, for example, you can upload their portrait photo, and add as many meaningful images you like into the photo album. Each time you open Deva World, you’ll find them, ready for you to use.

Step 3. Download Deva World from your App Store. On your tablet (remember, Deva World is for tablet only), head to the App store (for iPad), or the Google Play Store (other tablets). Use the ‘search’ function to find Deva World. It’s a free download.  Deva World should now be on the home screen (look for the blue and orange ‘D’ symbol)

Step 4. Tap open Deva on your tablet, and sign in (use your ‘join’ email and password).

Step 5. The next screen after sign-in displays the loved one’s player-profile. If you are a care professional, you may have more than one player-profile to choose from. In this case, scroll to find your client’s player-profile, and select.  Deva begins.

Yay, you are up and running!

(Make sure your tablet is always connected to wifi)

Head to Deva Dashboard to set-up each loved-one’s player-profile. You can add as many players as you want; each will have a separate profile and media library. When you set up a loved-one’s player-profile for the first time, we ask you to customize their profile with their portrait photo. Players enjoy seeing their photo when Deva World starts. You can also upload photos to their family album (via the Dashboard), which helps the loved one to make Deva World their special place.

No. As the admin caregiver, you job is to ‘join’. Once joined, you will set up the loved-one’s player profile on the Deva dashboard. You will also administer the subscription attached to the player-profile and any of their customizations until such time as you wish to ‘handover’. (To handover, go the loved-one’s player-profile on the Dashboard.)

A ‘Care Circle’ is a great way to involve others and share the caregiving load. Typically, the care circle is made up of family, friends, volunteers and care professionals. Sharing is free and unlimited, providing authorisation has been given by the admin-caregiver. 

Care circle members can play Deva with the loved one, using their own tablets, and access the Dashboard to see the loved-one’s play history.

Setting up a care circle

Remind your circle that in order to have access they must first accept the email invitation. The admin-caregiver generates this with a simple click from the loved-one’s player profile on the Dashboard. (Look for the “share” button on the loved-one’s player-profile.) Once sharing is mutually agreed, the new member then “join”s via our website.

What is shared? 

Each authorised Care Circle member can access the loved-one’s player-profile, including player history and the “Players shared with me” list. And they share the Deva World program, itself, which they will receive on their own tablet device. 

1. Play history

Care Circle members have access to the loved-one’s play history. They can see who played with the loved-one, how long play lasted, the most visited and active places, and caregiver comments.

2. Deva World

The beauty of this Care Circle feature is that it allows Deva to go wherever and to whomever you wish. For example, have Deva available for your loved-one when they visit a day-activities center, become an in-patient in hospital, or join an assisted living community. Care circle members in such places will need to join,  download the app (for free on their tablets) and go to the dashboard to find their loved-one’s profile. Once done, they will be able to play with the loved-one’s personalised Deva World environment. 

3. Care circle members can see who else is in the care circle.

4., Subscription costs.

When it’s time for a different caregiver to take responsibility for billing, easily hand-over the administrator privilege with a single click. We call this a “hand-over”. A single click from the loved-ones’ player profile is all that is required. An email is then sent to the nominated person. If they agree, they then become the person responsible for billing and care circle invitations.

Establishing rapport at the outset is the most important way to start. Bring the same warm approach to the session as you would to any usual enjoyable activity. Explain that ‘tapping’ makes things happen—it may not be intuitive. Think of DEVA as “play” rather than a game: there is no set goal, no set time, no finishing point. As a wise person once said: it’s not about getting there—it’s the journey that counts. Once you have joined, you’ll find a full list of hints and tips, how-to videos and a quickstart quide on your dashboard

Use your understanding of the person to sense when they have had enough. Asking is a good way! Durations of 20 – 30 minutes are usual. A session may be longer, say 45 minutes, or it may not be the day for Deva, and the session will be shorter. To end the Deva World session, press the “end session” button in the center top of the screen twice. This will send you to the “end session” screen, where you’ll see the duration played. You should select the emoticon that best describes the session, and add comments. Your comments will be very useful to others in the care circle. We suggest you make a note of any changes in your player’s mood. Why not note your own mood, too. As a caregiver, your well-being is critical; it’s your journey, too! Once done, press “Confirm”. Your feedback will be logged and sent to the Deva Dashboard.